France’s symbolic Marianne gets a new look

  In France she has more or less the same status as the Statue of Liberty in the United States. Her bust or portrait or image in one form or another adorns not only French stamps, banknotes and official letterheads but virtually every government or local mayor’s office throughout the country. She is and has been the symbol of the French republic ever since popular revolution overthrew the country’s monarchy in the late 18th century. But this year, she is going to get a new look and, for the first time in history, any French citizen or anyone living in France or its overseas departments, French or not, has a chance to decide what that new look will be. The French post office, “La Poste,,” has issued a nationwide call for new look design ideas, with the promise that the winning entry will wind up on a new French Marianne stamp. Regional juries will make a pre-selection of laudable entries between March 16 and April 15. From April 16 to May 6, a jury of national experts will narrow the choices down further to 100 possible new spruced-up Mariannes. Those 100 finalists will be put on exhibition in June throughout the country, and the public’s preferences solicited. After all that, Jacques Chirac, President of the Republic, will get to pick the official winner for the new French stamp which will be issued just less than a year from now in January, 2005. The novelty this year is that the competition, usually limited to professional designers and engravers, is open to the public. Actually, however, Marianne’s image on French stamps has been changed no less than five times since her first appearance in 1945 when the choice was made by Free French hero General Charles de Gaulle. Marianne’s postal image is not necessarily the same for all her other appearances in French officialdom. The models for those many busts in mayors’ office throughout the country, which change with the passage of years, have included actresses such as Brigitte Bardot and Catherine Deneuve, fashion models such Inès de la Fressange and Laeticia Casta, and, latest in line, a moderately well-known television personality, Evelyne Thomas. French officials more or less are expected to have some kind of Marianne image on display, but they are not obliged, in their choices of statues or paintings, to have the officially designated Marianne of the day. If they happen to like Brigitte Bardot or Laeticia Casta, they can keep her, even after successors are named. La Poste has made entering the competition as easy as possible for anybody who would like to take a shot at creating the new Marianne. Entries should be drawn with black ink on a white background within a rectangle measuring 9 x 13 centimeters. Photocopies (not the originals) of the design then can be sent to arrive prior to March 15, 2004 via internet to www.laposte.fr or by mail to: La Poste/Opération MarianneLibre Réponse N° 4329792269 FONTENAY AUX ROSES CEDEXFrance. On the back of the photocopy, the originator should mark clearly his or her first and last name, address, telephone number and date of birth. Entries, which must be the original work of the author and not encumbered with copyright restrictions, can be sent free of postage within France or its overseas departments. On its website, to help inspire eager-to-draw candidates, La Poste also displays every week 10 new submissions. That doesn’t mean they are selected, just displayed. Although historians haven’t been able to pin down for sure where Marianne acquired her name, the most common explanation is that it evolved from Marie-Anne, a highly popular name among French country people at the time of the revolution. While her coiffure and her headdress have often been changed, the best known images of Marianne have her wearing some kind of red, white and blue ensemble, topped off by a “Phrygian” bonnet–a close-fitting cap with a peak sometimes trailing behind but often sweeping forward much like the crest on a Roman military helmet. Because it was the style of bonnet worn by freed former slaves in ancient Greece and Rome, it has been adopted for Marianne as a symbol of liberty. While would-be new look designers have free reign to envisage their Marianne in any way they wish, La Poste cautions that, in these politically correct times, the winning entry certainly will be selected from those that best sum up Marianne’s embodiment, not only of France’s fundamental “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity” values, but also manage to work in her engagement in favor of environmental protection. Ready! Set! To your drawing boards! Fame awaits you. An accredited member of the foreign press corps, Minnesota native Robert (Bud) Korengold first came to Europe in 1955 after serving in the Korean war. A Chevalier in the order of Tastevin in Burgundy, the recipient of a Presidential Award for Sustained Superior Accomplishment in the conduct of foreign policy, and a member of the order of Palmes Academiques and the order of Arts et Lettres, he lives in Normandy doing a bit of gardening and a bit of writing and a lot of amused reflection about life in France and with the French.